Natural Image Statistics for Natural Image Segmentation

We integrate a model for filter response statistics of natural images into a variational framework for image segmentation. Incorporated in a sound probabilistic distance measure, the model drives level sets toward meaningful segmentations of complex textures and natural scenes. Despite its enhanced descriptive power, our approach preserves the efficiency of level set based segmentation since each region comprises two model parameters only. Analyzing thousands of natural images we select suitable filter banks, validate the statistical basis of our model, and demonstrate that it outperforms variational segmentation methods using second-order statistics.